Who Benefits from the Status Quo?

Stephen White of Catholic University reflects on the recent reports from the meeting of Pope Francis and President Biden, in which the president claims the pope told him that Biden is a “good Catholic” and that he should keep receiving Communion. White notes that this is not a new form of engagement:

“Yet there’s something strange about the narrative that would hold up Pope Francis’ example of dialogue and engagement as a counterpoint to the U.S. bishops, as if that approach has never been tried here before. It has been tried. And tried. And tried. And after four decades of trying, Joe Biden has gone from wavering uncertainty on the issue of abortion to full-throated advocacy for abortion as a fundamental human right.

One wonders if the Holy Father knows this. Does he know that the model of engagement he advocates has been the pastoral status quo (with few exceptions) for more than 40 years, and that Biden (and others) have used that interminable dialogue as a pretense for using their Catholic faith as political cover for promoting abortion. The freshness of that dialogue turned rancid long ago.”

Read the whole column.

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